NASCAR Cup Series

'Big Daddy' Bowyer? Drivers react to Clint becoming a dad

Published Oct. 1, 2014 7:26 p.m. ET

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There are few in the NASCAR garage with as much personality as Michael Waltrip Racing's Clint Bowyer.

Bowyer knows how to have fun, enjoys a good party for sure, and reportedly once woke up with a driveshaft in his bed after winning at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

Well, life just got much different for the 35-year-old driver from Emporia, Kansas.

After announcing the birth of his first child on Wednesday, some of his fellow racers -- and fellow fathers -- gave their assessment of how Bowyer will handle the responsibilities of being a new dad.

"What's the name of that movie? The one where he stands and pees on the wall? 'Big Daddy'? That's going to be Bowyer for sure," joked Matt Kenseth, a father of three girls. "As much as I like Clint, I don't know that our family units will spend a lot of time together. We'll just see how he does with this parenting thing first."

Denny Hamlin, who had a daughter in 2013, understands how having a child will change a lot of things, particularly your TV viewing habits.

"I think that (NASCAR reporter) Marty Smith probably said it best when he said, 'Mishka, Mooshka, Mickey Mouse,'" said Hamlin. "That's what he'll be watching over and over and over again. He'll understand. He'll know what 'Doc McStuffins' is, and 'Jake and the Never Land Pirates,' and he'll get all that very, very soon."

Kevin Harvick's son Keelan has enjoyed the spotlight his Sprint Cup driver dad has provided, and the former teammate of Bowyer believes Clint will make a great dad.

"I think as you see him, as I have, around kids and around people," said Harvick, "it will be fun to watch him — life is going to change regardless of whether he thinks it's going to. There's a point now that you can't just give them back to their parents and you have to stay up with them at night, and take them on the road, and change that crappy diaper, and pull over on the side of the road and realize that you have to change that crappy diaper in the middle of the highway. You know all those stories will be fun and dramatic to listen to, but he's going to be a great dad. Just seeing him adjust to it is going to be part of the process."

Like everything in life, Bowyer is no doubt already having fun with becoming a new dad, just hours into it.

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